Also shared is that pithy and kinda witty language: Juno said, “Hi, I’m calling to procure a hasty abortion …” and “They call me the cautionary whale.” Thao sings, “As sharp as I sting / It still soothes you, doesn’t it?” And then, “We don’t dive / We cannonball.” In the end, Thao relishes in the same aesthetic as the hit movie Juno: Animated and spunky and a little bit predictable. But there’s undeniable appeal in magically recognizing a tune at first listen.

Critics called that magic “old fashioned values” in reference to Juno. I’ll just call it — I don’t know — charm, and also cohesion, simplicity, craft. Whatever that special quality is, like Juno this winter, Thao is surely poised to be a hit.

Related

After seeing the half-baked crapjob that is 10,000 B.C., I realized an important thing about historical movies: when they’re dumb, they’re really dumb. Bad acting is one thing, but bad acting when you’re discussing woolly mammoths is quite another.

I never thought I’d say this, but orphans scare the bejesus out of me. In the same vein as Stephen King’s classic Children of the Corn, The Orphanage manages to take the most innocent and harmless characters and turn them into the most frightening fiends. The wildly successful Spanish import (originally titled El Orfanato) was directed by Juan Antonio Bayona, who has previously been recognized exclusively for his Spanish pop music videos. Executive producer Guillermo del Toro (director of 2006’s Pan’s Labyrinth) appears to have had much creative influence over this surrealistic horror film, which stylistically bears a strong resemblance to Pan’s Labyrinth.